The prayers of both could not be answered ~ that of neither has been answered fully. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces but let us judge not that we be not judged. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God and each invokes His aid against the other. Each looked for an easier triumph and a result less fundamental and astounding. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. To strengthen perpetuate and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war while the government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. "One eighth of the whole population were colored slaves not distributed generally over the union but localized in the southern part of it. Both parties deprecated war but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place devoted altogether to saving the Union without war insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war ~ seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. "On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. With high hope for the future no prediction in regard to it is ventured. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends is as well known to the public as to myself and it is I trust reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. Now, at the expiration of four years during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation little that is new could be presented. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. "Fellow countrymen: at this second appearing to take the oath of the presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first.